Konstantin K. Likharev - Essential Quotes for Scientists and Engineers

Book cover of Essential Quotes for Scientists and Engineers

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For following Sir Winstons advice taken for the epigraph, there are many quote collections available, both in print and onlinesee, e.g., the list of references at the end of this publication. However, I could not find a collection that would be, to my taste, reasonably comprehensive, at the same time being sufficiently refined for a typical busy member of the science/engineering community, to which I belong. This is why I dare to offer this community (including students of STEM disciplines) a modest set of less than 2500 my personal favorites, accumulated over nearly a decade of bedtime reading. These quotes (on quite a few topics, not just science and engineering per se) have been selected for either their importance for the community, or depth of thought, or witor all of the above. Any selection implies a certain bias, but this collection still includes different perspectivesin my humble view, all non-trivialon quite a few debatable issues.

To make consecutive reading of the quotes more engaging, the entries are not only grouped into topical sections, but also thematically ordered inside each section, forming quasi-continuous narrative threads. The unavoidable twists and turns and (less frequent) breaks of the threads are marked with three-asterisk lines. The text and the authorship of each quote have been carefully verified. If the time of its first publication (sometimes posthumous) could be established, it is given after the authors name; if not, some idea of its timing may be obtained from the years of authors life, listed in the Author Index, and also from my footnote comments. Since most of these comments address the authorship and timing issues, they may be safely ignored by the reader interested only in the quote contents.

Contents

Footnotes

K. K. Likharev (ed.) Essential Quotes for Scientists and Engineers https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-63332-5_1

A short saying often contains much wisdom . Sophocles, fifth century BC I quote others only in order to express myself better. Michel de Montaigne, 1595 The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose . William Shakespeare, 1596 The next best thing to being witty oneself, is to be able to quote anothers wit. Christian Nestell Bovee, 1862 When reading a scholarly critic, one profits more from his quotations than from his comments . H. H.

Auden, 1962 Thats the point of quotations, you know: one can use anothers words to be insulting . Amanda Cross, 1971 Quotation, n. The act of repeating erroneously the words of another . Ambrose Bierce, 1911 Misquotation is, in fact, the pride and privilege of the learned. Hesketh Pearson, 1934 As many people, so many pronouncements . Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1876 I always have a quotation for everything it saves original thinking . Dorothy L. Dorothy L.

Sayers, 1932 A witty saying proves nothing . Voltaire, 1767

Of several later paraphrases of this quip, perhaps the most popular is one by W. Somerset Maugham: The ability to quote is a serviceable substitute for wit. The original Latin sounds even better: Quot homines, tot sententiae.

K. K.

Likharev (ed.) Essential Quotes for Scientists and Engineers https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-63332-5_2

All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them . Galileo Galilei, 1632 The more original a discovery, the more obvious it seems afterwards . Arthur Koestler, 1970 The problem is not so much to see what nobody has yet seen, as to think what nobody has yet thought. Arthur Schopenhauer, 1851 It isnt that they cant see the solution.

It is that they cant see the problem . G. K. Chesterton, 1935 To see what is in front of ones nose needs a constant struggle . George Orwell, 1946 There is no regular procedure, no logical system of discovery, no simple, continuous development . Anonymous *** It requires a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious . Alfred North Whitehead, 1925 Talent hits a target no one else can hit; genius hits a target no one else can see. Arthur Schopenhauer, 1844 In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty . Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1841 From an individual exceptional man alone is any great addition to be expected to a sum of original conceptions.